Thursday, July 13, 2017

Quilt Retreat

Each year for the past 10 years I have been invited to attend a quilting retreat and this year the dates chosen did not work for me so it was time to take matters into my own hands and do my own quilt retreat over the last 2 days. There are some advantages such as no 5 hour round drive, no packing and unpacking of the car at either end, not having to pre-plan projects ahead, my whole sewing room to myself, not having to queue up to use the iron and of course there are very big disadvantages such as having to prepare all meals and clean up, the opportunity to cruise around the room to be inspired and motivated by what others are working on and of course that laughter and chatter of like minded people. I took this opportunity to re-visit the projects mentioned in my last post and pick up where these had been left off. Firstly the item that I started at the retreat last year which was a variation of a rail fence. This was a very easy design and went together well but a decision had to be made - make it larger or end it where it is and a have a tablerunner. I went with the latter and only had to make 3 more blocks, add a border etc. You can see below that it is now sandwiched and pinned ready to quilt.

Next I unfolded the rainbow quilt - which now has a good home to go to when finished - and measured it to find that it needs another row of blocks plus some sashing and borders to make it the required width. It does have green in it already but the green was "shades of the rainforest" so this time I pulled all plain greens or green with white and made 6 more 9 patch blocks.

The next colour is pale pink - again there is already pink in the quilt but it was hot pink - so all the pale pinks with white or other soft colours were used. So far these are only cut and laid out ready to be sewn.

I needed a break from all this cutting and headed back to the rail fence tablerunner after breakfast this morning and worked solidly on quilting it, then after lunch on went the binding and yeah I have a finished item to show from my quilting retreat. I am doubly happy as I had nominated one of these items to be finished by the end of the month for July's OMG.

I may even have sometime tomorrow to sneak back into my sewing room and get those pale pink 9 patch blocks finished.

It feels good to be able to tick one off the list and have another on the way to completion. I must do another "at home quilting retreat" in the not too distant future to see what else can be achieved.

Good for you for holding your own personal quilt retreat and moving along on your quilts! Your table runner is sweet! Hope you made it back to your sewing room to continue progress on your rainbow quilt.